Zaid Nasser (pronounced ‘zayd’) is one
of the most authentic voices on saxophone today. As the son of jazz and
blues great, bassist Jamil Nasser (neé George Joyner), Zaid was
born and bred on the jazz scene. As a young saxophonist, he often spent
his days with Papa Jo Jones, getting lessons in jazz and life from Father
Time himself. Early on, he was sitting in with Lou Donaldson and George
Coleman. He has been on the New York scene now for nearly twenty years.
He's played with Cecil Payne, Junior Cook, Jon Hendricks, and Harold Mabern.
He spent three years with Calvin Newborn's band in Memphis, crisscrossing
the south and playing in roadside juke joints, developing a rich, deep
sound all of his own. Zaid worked for three years with organist Bill Doggett,
and spent another three with Panama Francis in the Savoy Sultans. At the
original Smalls under Mitch Borden, he was a regular feature for nearly
a decade, leading his own quartet, co-leading a quintet with altoist Mike
Mullins, as a sideman in the Across 7 Street Septet, and as a part of
the Frank Hewitt’s legendary Saturday late night quintet. He was
earlier featured on two tracks as a part of Jazz Underground: Live At
Smalls on Impulse Records (IMPD245). His talents have also been recognized
by saxophonist/producer Ned Otter and included on his album The Secrets
Inside (TF004CD) released by the Two And Four Recording Co.

Zaid's sound is organic and authentic. He plays
smart music with a kind of freedom that is unusual, reminiscent of the
great underground alto saxophone legend Clarence “C” Sharpe.
Nasser’s unique personal tone and phrasing reveal intricately crafted,
imaginative, and ingenious musical lines, woven into tight thematic improvisation.
Though he goes for broke each time out, he never loses his balance, and
never slips into the musical gutter. His superb agility in navigating
through distant keys in his musical travels is one of the hallmarks of
the first-rate improviser, one who avoids the modern tendency to lapse
into simplified forms. There is plenty of challenge for the listener,
and this recording increasingly reveals its brilliance on repeated listenings.
You could scarcely wear this one out. As with Frank Hewitt, Nasser’s
note choices can be unexpected at first, but make no mistake, his playing
is exact down to the finest details.

The style of music herein is a form of bop, but
it should be clarified that this is not retro music or a throwback to
the 40s and 50s. In fact it follows from continued development in the
intricate bop idiom in New York over more than forty years since that
time. You can hear in Elmo Hope’s final 1966 recordings, for example,
a form of bop that did not exist before, and a form that continued in
development through a number of key figures, and often in the inner-circles
of the New York jazz scene. If you are lucky enough to have heard C Sharpe,
or to have caught Junior Cook in his later years, or if you’ve listened
to Frank Hewitt, you have some idea of what I mean. These players did
not play the bop that was; they continued to grow and develop throughout
their careers, and the form of bop they fostered is more advanced over
the historical forms, and at least as challenging. That music advances
today through the work of a number of players familiar to the original
Smalls scene (and this label), such as Ari Roland, Sacha Perry, Chris
Byars, Mike Mullins, William Ash, and Zaid Nasser. For this date, Zaid’s
working group, comprising longtime collaborators Sacha Perry, Ari Roland
and Phil Stewart from Zaid’s working group, join him for this date.
They know all of Zaid’s moves and move freely and without hesitation
into any musical territory Zaid wants to travel into.

Speaking of travels, the title Escape From New York
is given to us by Zaid “because it seems that’s what I’m
always doing.” He spent nearly three years as a celebrated artist
playing in Armenia with talented pianist Vahagn Hayrapetian. At this writing,
he is performing in Dubai for a few months. Like Frank Hewitt, he knows
something of what it is like to be playing head and shoulders above the
pack and still scrounging. You should take that as a sign of his uncompromising
artistry. The result is a pleasure to the ears, and his debut here will
be a revelation to some. Zaid has few words to contribute to these notes,
preferring to let the music speak for itself, which it does, and eloquently.
“I’m Zaid Nasser and I am what I am,” he wrote. And
that is truly somebody special.